ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the mechanisms by which ethnolinguistic minorities of Nigeria draw attention to their language and culture, both to reinforce ethnic unity and to present that culture to outsiders. It focuses on locally published books, which began to appear slowly in the 1950s but which have recently undergone a major expansion. It looks at the content and motivation of these newly commissioned ethnographic surveys and the structural models they follow. Finally the chapter critiques the notion of the invention of African ethnicity in the academic sphere. Postindependence African university systems were expanding and buying anthropology monographs for libraries. A consequence of rising literacy and a more-or-less formed perception of the impact of globalisation on local cultures has, however, stimulated a need for indigenous ethnography. Nigeria has an academic historical tradition that, by and large, has proceeded in parallel, largely ignoring these accounts in favour of directly recorded oral tradition or archive documents.
